This past Sunday, I volunteered to help build and march the rainbow balloons during the Gay Pride Parade. I had a blast. Although there were some hiccups during the beginning, overall, it was just so much fun being surrounded by people who understood what they were doing and why. And proud to be there.

It's always difficult for me to understand why people just cannot be proud of what they are doing. Or why there is so much negativity that surrounds what they are accomplishing.

I work for a particular catering company that seems to breed this in their kitchen staff. Don't get me wrong: there are always a ton of negative people when it comes to the kitchen. There is a lot of ego and self-doubt that goes on in a kitchen. So much so that I have chosen to ignore it and just work. This particular catering company certainly creates an atmosphere where the staff talks about how much better they will be once they move on. Yet, here they still are. Not moving on.

I don't even understand why people don't move on. Especially when it comes to freelance work. I am a freelancer. I work for 5 caterers. There are thousands of caterers out there. I can name 3 in particular that I could send my resume to right now and get hired. So, if I were miserable at one, why would I bother accepting work there? This is the question that I continue to ask at that one particular catering company.

I don't think it's the company. I think it's the people. I think that at some point, we forget to look at what we do to contribute to our misery. There's a lot of stories we create for ourselves to justify our misery. There's a lot of falsehoods we hold on to make ourselves feel better. There's a lot of energy we waste trying to make everyone else feel as bad as we do.

It's sad.

Especially because once you let go of all of that bad feeling, you realize that it's just work. It's just life. And it really isn't that bad. It's actually quite good. It's actually quite exhilarating. And when all is said and done, it's something to be proud about. Later.